OCT 7 Wednesday.

I hit the ground and slide back while getting my hooves grounded, a second later I move my head out of the way of a pebble. I'm able to block a blow right after and land a small hit with my dagger before I'm pushed back yet again.

Stone truly emulates his name when it comes to combat, tough as hell, heavy, and it hurts to hit him. But even the strongest stone cracks and even Stone has openings, it's just about timing and knowing when to push an advantage. As I deflect another blow with my dagger I'm able to find such an opening and land a solid hit with my greatsword.

Normally I'd be concerned for a pony getting hit like that, but like I said Stone is a tough bastard. Which is why he's able to mostly shrug off the blow and get one of my forelegs, and just like that I'm once again on the dusty floor with a wooden sword to my throat.

After a moment he backs off and I'm able to stand again. "Not bad with that last blow, but you should have kept pressing instead of defending. My hooves weren't solidly placed and you could have knocked me down. Remember, always keep an eye open for things like that."

Stone may be a hard ass, but he knows what he's talking about. I nod and stand up to recover to dust myself off. "Ya, I know, but I'm a slow learner. That's why I have you to beat it into me." I joke, Stone isn't the joking type, but he does have a certain dark sense of humor.

Well, dark by pony standards, it's still very tame by human standards. He chuckles. "Sure Colt, just remember to get some rest." He says while putting away his weapon. "Also you should start thinking about what armor you want to use." He advises while dusting his coat off.

I raise a brow. "Armor?"

He nods. "I don't know much about making new combat styles, but I know they can vary greatly depending on the armor you use. Your style is roughly getting to the point that you need to choose a type soon before you keep going and find out the armor you want doesn't work well with the style you've made."

I think about that for a moment while putting away my wooden weapons. "Thanks, I'll give it some thought."

"Good." With that he walks out of the room, leaving me alone. What kind of armor do I want? I could go with a few different ideas, but I'd need to think about it more.

The combat style I'm slowly developing mostly involves me deflecting and blocking hits more than dodging them, so heavy armor might be fitting, and I like the idea of being a walking tank. But ponies don't make full cover plate armor like that, it doesn't fit the mobile and fast style of combat used by the guard.

So if I want heavy armor like that I'd need to find someone capable of making it, or make it myself. As I'm walking home and thinking about my options my mind shifts to Steel wood. I can make and manipulate it much more than before, but it's not a perfect material as it has a degree of weakness to magic, but it would be a good starting point.

When I get home Entropy is waiting for me like always. "Good?" She asks while demanding scratches from me.

She's been learning to use more words more often, but like with any child teaching them is a slow process. I smile at her, "Yes, good. Now, let's get you some lunch." Hearing that she eagerly flies off my back and lands on the counter while I gather what I'll need, a simple meal of fish and Spicy Red Root.

When we're finished eating I find one of my notebooks and a small sapling before having Entropy take me to.... Ya know, I never did name the Everfree camp, I'll need to think about that. Regardless when we arrive I take my time to check on the area, the grass now covers the entire camp in a soft blanket.

I've been slowly growing it over the past few weeks and it's a pleasant addition to this place. Beyond that, I've planted several small fields of crops, Blood Leaf Tea, Spicy Red Root, and some Regular crops like potatoes, carrots, Rocky Wheat, and some celery.

All the fields are ten by ten feet with one field for each crop, a total of six plots lined up near the shack on the south side of my camp. The reason I planted all of this is simple, I won't have to bring it here which takes time, and I can study the effects of high amounts of life magic on a wide variety of non-magical plants.

As for the Blood Leaf Tea, the Everfree is one of the few places that can grow the plant and bring out its magical effects without me needing to grow it. Even if it's slower I can grow a truly massive amount of tea with the space I have, and it gives me a chance to test if the tea is different when grown naturally, although I don't expect much of a difference.

And the final thing of note is a single small seed in the center of this grassy plain. Over the past few weeks, I've been feeding it a lot of life magic, and yet nothing has happened, yet. At this point even with the plant's ability to block life magic a large amount is radiating off of it.

It's not that noticeable at a few dozen feet away, but if I keep feeding it life magic then I might have problems with animals sensing it. I'm not sure what could do that beyond the Timberwolves, but at a certain point, the sheer amount of life magic could be sensed by things that can't normally.

Many beings can sense life magic, but to such a small degree that it's basically useless unless you're right next to a massive source of life magic. And it leaves me in a bind, I can't just leave it alone but I also can't move it unless something happens when I try, and I'm far too curious to stop trying to grow it.

But I might have a solution, and it involves a small sapling I've brought with me. This is the sapling grown from the branch I took off of the Golden Oaks library, but my solution is more of a theory than anything else. If the seed has shown the ability to block life magic, then can the wood do the same?

I place the sapling on the desk in my small shack and start growing the sapling into a one-foot cube of solid wood. It takes more magic than other woods but I'm able to finish it after a short while, when I'm done I cut it off of the base with my wood carving knife and move the wood block to the side while regrowing the sapling.

I take the wood block outside while keeping a small ruby enchanted with a light next to me to see, I decompose some of the wood and hollow out the inside of the cube while also removing the top. I dump out all the soil and see the faint gold lines running through the wood shine in the light.

I now have a rough box with a two-inch thick lining and a hollow space, just what I need for a simple test.

I walk over to the strange seed and simply place the living wood box upside down over it, the life magic I sense lessens slightly. It's not a massive amount but enough to hide the seed even more, I remove the crude box and start to plan this out a little more. But I stop moving when I feel something light up like a star in the dark.

Somethings nearby, and it has a lot of life magic, similar to the levels that Entropy and Philomena have, but not as much as Celestia. Still, something with that much life magic nearby immediately puts me on edge, I try to calm myself as I feel it getting closer.

I sprint over to my shack and find the only weapon I have right now, my simple dagger, not much but it is better than nothing. I'm honestly not sure what to do, part of me just wants to have Entropy take me home right now, but another part is both curious and reluctant.

Things with that much life magic are very rare, and I really want to know what it is. And at the same time, I don't want to just run away from this place, sure I've only been here a few weeks but this camp has already helped me in several ways and I've come to value having it.

I don't want to just give it up, feeling my thoughts run wild I take several deep breaths. Entropy is inside my shadow but leaves after she sees the slightly panicked state I'm in. She stands on my back and tries to comfort me. "OK? ok?" She has no idea why I'm like this and it's obviously making her nervous.

I turn to her with a serious but confident look, trying my best to reassure her. "I... Something is here, stay in my shadow and be prepared to take us home at a moment's notice." It's clear that does not help calm her down, but she still returns to my shadow a moment later.

I steady myself, keeping the dagger close to me as I walk outside again. I'll have Entropy take us home at the first sign of danger, but I refuse to just abandon this place without even knowing what's out there. I turn my magic light off and try my best to navigate in the dim light of the half moon.

The source of life magic is still getting closer, but it's not heading right for me, instead, it seems to be passing by the shield. I keep myself quiet as I slowly walk closer to the edge of the shield, all I see is the pitch-black forest stretching out of sight, it's impossible to make anything out, so I wait.

My nerves are a mess and I have to force myself to not move unnecessarily, words from Stone's lessons repeat in my mind as I mentally prepare myself for anything. He once told me to never give away my movements, when facing an enemy do not move unless needed.

The forest is completely black, and I also notice that everything has gone quiet, no bugs, no animals, just dead silence. I'm not sure how long I stood in the dark waiting, but eventually, I saw something. It starts as a very faint light cutting through the dark, but as the source of life magic gets closer so does the light.

After a while, I finally see what's approaching, and I'm both amazed and absolutely terrified. It was a snake, and it was unlike anything I had seen before. Its red scales give off a slight pale glow and despite its large size it moves in complete silence, even as branches break under it no noise is made.

I just froze my mind in disbelief at the thing in front of me, I silently watched as the snake, probably two feet tall at the head and maybe over a hundred feet long, silently moved right past my shield. I don't move in the slightest and watch as it slithers past.

In my shock I let it get too close, moving away now could be worse than staying still. So despite my fear and panic, I stand as still as I can while watching the massive snake move. But for a moment its head looks around and I see its tongue flick through the air. :OH FUCK!: This shield doesn't block scents from leaving it. The massive snake moves and I see its pale glowing red scales shift with its massive weight.

It turns in my direction and I prepare to run, I see the pale almost white eyes of the snake look round. After a few torturous moments of it flicking its tongue, it slowly moves closer, the only reason I don't run is a vain hope it will just leave, it touches the shield with its head and seems to look over it for, it licks the shield.

I stop breathing, holding my breath as I watch it inspect the shield, and after the longest moments of my life with the only noise being the pounding of my heart and the ringing of my blood in my ears it seems to lose interest and move away from the shield. I let out a breath and watched as it slowly moved through the forest silently, its massive glowing body and a seemingly endless sea of deep crimson-red scales.

I just wait in frozen silence until it's completely out of my sight before slowly walking back to the shack. :What in the absolute FUCK! WAS THAT THING?!: I'm honestly just glad it moved on, but I learned one thing, if I feel that thing gets close again, LEAVE IMMEDIATELY.

I can deal with animals, but that thing is on a whole other level, I can guarantee it would be able to break through the shield if it really wanted to. I force myself to calm down and focus on writing down everything I noticed before it slips from my memory, not that I'll be forgetting tonight anytime soon.

Despite my fear and slight dread, a part of me is excited to see such an amazing creature, it's not every day you see a massive magical snake hunting. I have so many questions about it and what it does, why does it glow? How does it move silently despite its size?

I focus and start with its physical body. Deep crimson red scales, with a pale white glow that seemed to cover its entire body. Eyes so white it almost looked blind, and then there's the size. I can't be exact, but it's roughly a hundred feet long and its head is probably two or maybe three feet tall.

And probably the most disturbing thing of all is that it was silent. Even as it moved and flicked its tongue it didn't make the slightest noise, nothing but pure silence. Something that big being able to just move through the forest silently is hellish, that was the apex of this forest, or at least one of them.

As for what it actually was? I have no idea. I'll definitely need to research it, but if nothing else I know it's a highly magical being. Magical creatures are rare, but most of them can be found in places sentient beings avoid. Old forests like this one, vast deserts, tall mountains.

Much like with humans, the sentient beings of this world hunted anything that could threaten them, and they still do. Powerful magical animals are smarter but oftentimes lack the intelligence to be bargained with, and that normally leads to them coming into conflict with one race or another.

And while they may be powerful, they are almost always alone, and no one being can fight a nation. So when a creature like this is encountered one of two things will happen. They run or die. A sad reality to be sure, but I'm not here to judge who if any is at fault for this being the case.

But there is some good news for me, while creatures this powerful are a definite threat they normally aren't that aggressive. They are often one of the most if not the most powerful beings in the area they inhabit, which makes them comfortable and confident, and because of that they often show little interest in weaker beings.

As an example that snake would have probably not eaten me. It's no guarantee, but I'm simply not an appealing meal. I'm three foot seven and it's almost at eye height with me when on the ground, I'm simply not a filling meal, and I'd also be a hard meal to earn.

While that snake could definitely break the shield it would still take a lot of effort and energy for such a small meal, to be blunt I'm not really worth it to the snake. It caught my scent but chose not to pursue me, mostly likely because it sensed this was my nest, and a well-guarded nest at that.

Something like that is probably very old, it's no stranger to different types of hunting, and it's definitely encountered ponies before so it would know and remember what I am. With how often I'm in my camp it would be easy for it to presume this is my nest, and it can probably tell how strong the shield is, at least to some degree.

It most likely knew I was a pony and only one pony as only my scent is here, and it decided to break into a heavily defended nest for so little reward, it wasn't worth its time. Like I said creatures like this aren't dumb, they're just not smart, they're probably smart enough to follow the same chain of logic I just did.

But all of this is just my best guesses, I'll need to do a lot of research to find out more, but one thing is for certain.

I underestimated this forest, and I don't plan to again.

Author's Note

Thanks for reading. :}
Current year is 993

Got any names for the camp?

Interesting fact. I love snakes more then birds, but only slightly.

Also I might take tomorrow off, not sure.